


took the long way looking for a shortcut

by ghosthunter, llwyncelyn



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Accidental Bonding, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Knotting, M/M, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:07:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21908677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghosthunter/pseuds/ghosthunter, https://archiveofourown.org/users/llwyncelyn/pseuds/llwyncelyn
Summary: There are a lot of reasons someone could be traded from a hockey team. Salary cap reasons, better player reasons, locker room poison reasons. Dynamic reasons. Not that anyone admits to the last one.
Relationships: Marcus Johansson/Jeff Skinner
Comments: 34
Kudos: 306





	took the long way looking for a shortcut

**Author's Note:**

> so this definitely happened.
> 
> thanks to babygotbackstrom for the beta.

_When Jeff first started to imagine his NHL debut, it never even crossed his mind to consider that it might happen across an ocean, playing in an exhibition game against the Wild in Helsinki._

_Between the excruciatingly long travel hours and the unfamiliar ground beneath his feet, Jeff sticks even closer to his new teammates than he might have back in Carolina, his nervousness and excitement jumbled into one huge mess of emotion, bleeding out of him in wave after wave._

_More than once, he catches his new captain, Staal, stealing a sidelong glance at him, looking for all the world like he wants to say something, anything, to get Jeff’s emotions back in check. It adds a whole other set of complications to his feelings; Jeff bristles at the thought of being commanded, at needing it before he even manages to hit the ice, but equally, he imagines the phantom heat of Staal’s hand, steady and firm at the base of his neck, and it settles Jeff more than anything else._

_But as much as Staal considers him, gaze dragging over him head-to-toe, he never makes a move into Jeff’s space. Jeff is as thankful for that as he is disappointed, and spends most of his time red-cheeked and jittery._

_He, at the very least, doesn’t embarrass himself nearly as much on the ice. Jeff manages an assist on Ruutu’s goal in their second game, and bags the shootout winner, notching his first points before he’s even set foot on home ice._

_It should, by rights, make his Carolina debut that much easier, but when he’s finally sitting in his stall, name printed clear and bold above his gear, that nervousness comes rushing back._

_There’s so much pressure on him to fall right into step with the team, to be the player Carolina believes he can be, the player they used such a high draft pick on. The margin for error is balancing on the edge of his blades, one wrong move and he’ll be down in the minors before he can blink. And now he’s here, now he has a taste for NHL ice, the speed and intensity of the game, he doesn’t want anything else._

_Jeff is so caught up in his thoughts that he doesn’t even register that Staal has dropped onto the bench next to him. It’s only when the heat from his thigh, pressed up against Jeff’s, starts to soak into him that he lets out a shuddering breath, finally looking up._

_“We’ve all been there,” is what Staal says, a smile quirking at his lips. Jeff doesn’t know if he’s reminiscing about his own debut, or is amused at how much Jeff has managed to work himself up. Or both. “Thought I was going to throw up when they announced me before warm-ups, my first game.”_

_Jeff runs his tongue out and across his lips. Staal tracks the movement, and huffs out a laugh. He rests his hand on top of Jeff’s head, the pads of his fingers scratching through his hair, and it makes Jeff run hotter than he ever has before. “You’ll be alright, kid. You’ve got this.”_

_It seems like a sure thing when Staal says it, his voice steady and true, as though there’s no other option for Jeff than to have a good game. That belief curls deep in Jeff’s gut, making its home there, brokering no space for doubt._

_“I’ve got this,” Jeff echoes back, as Staal swipes his thumb firm along the back of his head. “Captain.”_

_There’s a beat that passes, while Staal considers him, hand still in his hair. “Eric,” he says, finally, looking expectantly into Jeff’s eyes._

_“Eric,” Jeff returns, with a smile, his cheeks blotchy, and Eric returns it in kind. It feels right, more right than anything, a familiar weight on his tongue, though it’s the first time he’s ever used Eric’s name._

_If Eric allows him, it won’t be the last. Not for a long, long time._

\-----

There are a lot of reasons someone could be traded from a hockey team. Salary cap reasons, better player reasons, locker room poison reasons. Dynamic reasons. Not that anyone admits to the last one.

The first time Marcus was traded, it was for cap reasons. Mostly. He’s sure that the fact that he was an Alpha who hadn’t bonded to anyone or even hinted at it had pushed the decision a little. With the Capitals, there was always a more aggressive alpha who overshadowed him. And he was fine with that. But he thinks that maybe other people weren’t.

After the Capitals sold him to the Devils for picks - he’s not _bitter_ , he knows it was a salary cap thing, it’s fine that it’s picks, it’s totally fine - the Devils kind of expected that not only would he help with the whole “sucking at hockey” thing, but that he’d help them with some of the new players coming in.

But then he spent more time on IR than he spent playing, and even though both of their new rookies were Omegas, neither of them was interested in anything Marcus had to offer. He gave the Devils the best he could. And they gave him to Boston.

Boston was different, because it was a temporary stop on the way to something else and they never meant to keep him. It wasn’t about dynamic, it was about New Jersey’s fire sale and Boston’s Cup run.

He wants Buffalo to be different. He’s in Buffalo and they have a new coach and they’re not going to suck at hockey anymore. Like the Devils.

It’s a fresh start and everything’s going to be great. And then he gets to his first practice and he remembers: Skinner.

He doesn’t hate Jeff Skinner. He tried to punch Skinner’s face in once when he was 22, but a referee stopped him. Or maybe he stopped himself because he’s terrible at throwing punches. The point is that he tried, because there’s something about Skinner that gets under his skin. Something about Skinner that makes his skin itch.

So, of course, they’re immediately put on a line together.

And it’s fine. It’s totally fine and Marcus can ignore the feeling that lurks at the back of his mind, screaming for him to punch Skinner in the face at any given point in time. But Marcus is nothing if not a master of ignoring things his instincts are telling him to do. It makes him a decent person, but it also makes him a terrible Alpha.

It’s not like the hockey isn’t good. The hockey is great. They have incredible chemistry on the ice, when Marcus ignores his instincts to punch and Skinner isn’t being a snappy little monster. Skinner’s one of the most combative Omegas Marcus has ever met. He’s not cowed by the other Alphas on the team, and, more than once, Marcus watches him prickle when an Alpha commands him.

He obeys, but he prickles.

As a rule, Marcus tries not to use his command voice. It’s another thing that’s made him a terrible Alpha. He just doesn’t like the idea of taking someone’s free will away just because his biology outranks theirs. There are a lot of problems with who they are biologically, and Marcus doesn’t believe they should be beholden to that.

There’s only so much he can do to fight against it.

\-----

_There are no words to accurately describe the way Jeff’s heart feels twisted up in his throat. He swallows thickly, fingers curled tight into his dress pants, hoping with a tinge of something akin to desperation that the cameras aren’t picking up on the fact that he’s about to vibrate out of his skin._

_The All-Star draft probably shouldn’t feel anything remotely like this. It’s not that serious, he knows. It’s an excuse to mess around playing something that only passingly resembles hockey and get drunk all weekend. And yet he’s sick with a nervousness he hasn’t experienced since his actual, honest-to-god draft day._

_Maybe it’s the home crowd. Maybe he should have lobbied Eric to take him higher. It worked for Cam. Eric picked_ him _first overall._

_He exhales. It’s fine. He’s the youngest ever omega to participate in an All-Star, scratch that, the youngest ever player. It’s nothing personal. It’s--_

_“It’d be weird not having him sit beside me,” Eric says. Jeff’s heart feels like it has skittered to a stop. “So, we’re going to go with, from the Carolina Hurricanes, Jeff Skinner.”_

_Jeff’s not sure if his smile or his laugh are bordering on hysterical, as he makes his way up, surrounded by a cacophony of screaming as the home crowd goes wild. He reaches for Eric’s hand, refusing to acknowledge the tremble still lingering at the tips of his fingers, more adrenaline now than anything else._ ‘It’d be weird not having him sit beside me’ _echoing in his head._

_Eric tugs him closer, a gentle touch to his arm settling him, for a moment, before Jeff starts to peel off his jacket. Next thing Jeff knows, Eric is handing him a Team Staal jersey thick with his scent, and he pats his back a few times, his hand a warm comfort through the fabric of Jeff’s shirt._

_“Like I wasn’t going to choose you,” Eric rumbles under his breath, looking entirely too pleased with himself. Jeff can’t breathe._

_He barely even registers his introduction, a smile splitting his face from just how euphoric he feels. He doesn’t even want to imagine the spike in his scent – sweet, Eric had once said, his happiness was like a burst of sweetness – and just how obvious it will be to everyone around them how much his captain affects him._

_“Did you lobby Eric, the way Cam Ward lobbied Eric,” he’s asked, and Jeff can’t help the way his gaze flits over, watching as Eric licks at his lips._

_“I don’t know how Cam lobbied him,” Jeff says, and Eric is smiling in return. “I know that I sit beside him in the locker room and sometimes I give him a little bit of extra space. Just in case he needs it. So, I guess it worked.”_

\-----

Jeff is a fighter, is the thing.

(And privately, Marcus isn’t sure when he made the shift from thinking of him as Skinner to thinking of him as Jeff, but he did.)

He takes roughing penalties, he gets into fights, he never shuts his mouth. He takes on guys twice his size without a second thought. He gets into fights for himself, he gets into fights to defend his teammates.

Marcus knows this, but the first time it happens and Jeff is defending him, it’s still a little weird. Someone slams into Marcus from behind and crunches him into the boards, and he ends up on the ice in a heap, winded. When he finally drags in a breath deep enough into his lungs that he can focus on anything but breathing, Jeff is already yelling at the top of his lungs and clinging to someone’s jersey. Marcus doesn’t even know if it’s the guy who hit him.

“Jeff,” Marcus says, skating to the edge of the scrum, still a little out of breath. It comes out in the full force of his command voice, even though he doesn’t mean it to.

Jeff snaps to him like a rubber band, all roiling energy and fury simmering just under his skin.

All Marcus can do is mouth “sorry,” at him as he heads to the bench and Jeff heads for the penalty box.

\-----

_Jeff inhales a sharp breath as Faulk is taken hard into the boards._

_The ref’s whistle pierces the air, Faulk slow and unsteady as he gets back to his skates, but all Jeff can hear is the pounding of blood in his ears. Heat rises in his cheeks and he’s already skating into the fray, thunderous anger thrumming under his skin._

_Jeff is moments away from shucking off his gloves to take Rinaldo to task, heart racing, when all his fight leaves him in a rush. Firm fingers squeeze at his nape, warm, a little clammy, but insistent._

_“Hey,” Eric says, voice even and low, with an authority that Jeff knows has nothing to do with the C stitched to his chest. The pads of his fingers dig in a little more, and oh. He’s removed his glove. “Settle down.”_

_The ruddiness in Jeff’s cheeks is less fury more embarrassment as he looks up at Eric from beneath his lashes. There’s amusement dancing in his eyes, but Jeff knows that if he tried to push he’d be unyielding. “You good?” Eric asks._

_“Yeah,” Jeff answers after a beat. “I’m good.”_

\-----

The worst part of having accidentally commanded Jeff is that now Marcus feels guilty about it. It doesn’t help that when they get to the locker room, he can still feel the anger rolling off of Jeff. He can smell it in the air, too, and it makes him sneeze several times in succession.

Jeff turns and stares at him.

All Marcus gets out of his apology in that moment is, “Uhhhh,” which is definitely how he planned for his apology to go.

“Leave me alone,” Jeff says, and Marcus thinks it’s fair for Jeff to be pissed at him. It doesn’t matter if Marcus is an assistant captain or not, he knows that Jeff doesn’t like for Alphas to command him.

The brief thought of if it would be different, if it was Jeff’s bonded Alpha, flits through his mind. It’s pretty irrelevant to the situation.

“I, uh,” Marcus says, slightly less graceless than his first attempt. At least this attempt contains an actual word. “I wanted to apologize. For what I did during the game.”

“I was protecting you,” Jeff says.

Marcus doesn’t know what to say to that. He doesn’t feel like it was particularly protecting, but he appreciates the sentiment. He sighs.

“I didn’t mean to say it like that,” Marcus says. “I try not to - you know. Command. It slipped out, and I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Jeff says. “Don’t do it again.”

“I won’t,” Marcus says. He doesn’t intend to. He didn’t even mean to the first time.

He can’t shake the thought of how Jeff would react to his bonded Alpha commanding him. Would he be as prickly about it? Would he give into it if it were _his_ Alpha? And why is Marcus even thinking about it?

He doesn’t want to be Jeff’s Alpha. He doesn’t really want to be anyone’s Alpha.

He dreams about commanding Jeff onto his knees that night and he wakes up tangled in his sheets, sweaty and hard. It’s not the first time he’s dreamt something like this about an Omega teammate. He knows it’s just their hormones affecting him.

He doesn’t think about Jeff when he jerks off at all.

\-----

_Jeff should have known, the moment that he’d kicked out his skate, that he was going to be facing some sort of reprimand._

_What he’d done had been reckless in every sense of the word, dangerous even, and could have done some serious damage to Nichol. But in the moment, with adrenaline coursing through him like an endless, raging fire, the sheer frustration of being targeted, game after game after game, prickling under his skin, he’d reacted on his most base instincts._

_He hadn’t been thinking, beyond getting out from under the press of bodies, of lashing out in a way that, for a brief moment, felt satisfying in a sick, twisted way. Until the cold, harsh reality of what he’d done came washing over him, cloying in his throat._

_Jeff had waited for the sharp pierce of the ref’s whistle to cut through the air, for him to get hauled up by a fistful of his jersey and skated off to the box, but it never came. Play continued on, and there was no more time to think, beyond getting back into the fray, trying to battle the puck out from against the boards. And by the time the dying moments of the third rolled around, he’d even managed to contribute a goal of his own to their shutout of the Blues._

_For Cam’s 200th win in Carolina, it really couldn’t have been more perfect even if they’d tried._

_They’d gone out after, of course, celebrated the milestone the way that it deserved, and any thoughts of what had happened faded away under the pleasant buzz of alcohol, and the warm press of Eric against his side, an arm slung across the back of the booth, fingers brushing against his shoulder whenever he moved._

_Those thoughts, the memory of Eric’s touch, and the heat of his skin sinking into his shirt, were what Jeff had carried with him back to his bed, later, as he’d drifted into sleep, unable to stop himself from pressing his smile into the pillow._

_But the league hadn’t forgotten._

_Jeff’s phone wakes him earlier than he’d like, his head fuzzy and his mouth full of cotton, as he fumbles to answer the call. He’s not entirely lucid when the words “two game suspension” come down the line, and it’s as though someone has dumped a bucket of ice water over his head._

_He feels sick, as the explanation is given in the most clinical manner, and just nods along, numb, as he tries to take it all in._

_Jeff doesn’t remember hanging up, of letting his phone hit the sheets with a soft thud, as he sinks back into them, tugging them over his head. He doesn’t want to look at, or hear, what the media will say, as soon as the news drops._

_Because beyond the recklessness, beyond his careless actions, some of the more traditional commentators will say what they’ve been saying since Jeff was drafted; that he needs an alpha to keep him in hand, to tame his wilder tendencies._

_Never mind that he’s still a kid. Never mind that he’s barely the other side of a concussion that robbed him of more games than he cares to count. Never mind that countless elbows and crosschecks are being missed, night in, night out, and when he fights back, lashes out--_

_Jeff drifts back to sleep, with the gentle vibrations of his phone going off, as his teammates and friends learn about his suspension. He doesn’t want platitudes. All he wants is to forget that the world exists. Just for a moment._

_It’s not until later, when the sun has gone down, and he finally wills his way out of bed, and to get up and eat something that he checks his phone, thumbing automatically to the message Eric has left him._

__We’ve all fucked up, _it says._ Prove them wrong. __

_The heat that goes through him is far more pleasant, this time. It’s nothing Jeff hasn’t told himself before, over and over. But there’s something about it coming from Eric that galvanizes him all the same, and he finds himself replying before he even registers his fingers moving._

__I will. __

_The media can write what they want. About his nature, about his need for an alpha. Jeff doesn’t need anything other than to show them his Calder-winning season wasn’t a fluke, that he’s worth every bit of faith that the Canes, that Eric, has poured into him._

_He’s going to prove it to all of them._

\-----

Marcus has dozed off on the couch when his phone starts ringing. He would say that he and Jeff are tentatively friends, but they're not the kind of people who call each other in the middle of the night. There's a quick, sharp curl of dread in Marcus's stomach that Jeff is in trouble; he must be to be calling Marcus in the night.

When he answers, what Jeff says is, "can you come and get me?" Not that he needs Marcus to come and get him - he could order an Uber just as easily as he could call Marcus - but if Marcus _can_.

"Just get an Uber," Marcus tells him. It's Buffalo, it's late, and it's fucking cold. Marcus is in for the night.

"Please," Jeff says.

Marcus doesn't particularly want to go, but he can hear in Jeff's voice that something's wrong. And Jeff's a teammate, and maybe even a friend, so he's going to go.

Jeff texts him the address and he throws a hoodie on over his t-shirt and heads out. The address Jeff gave him is a restaurant inside one of the local hotels; they're coming off a loss to Carolina and Jeff had gone to dinner with Jordan Staal after the game. 

He finds Jeff huddled into his coat just outside the restaurant and he hits the button for his warning lights as he pulls up to the curb and unlocks the doors for Jeff to jump in.

"Are you okay?" he asks.

Jeff responds with a short, bitten off, "yeah," and nothing else.

It's not true, because Jeff is so upset that Marcus can taste it on the back of his tongue when he breathes in. Marcus wants to spit. But Jeff doesn't offer any more information or conversation and Marcus doesn't press him. He's going to drop Jeff off and go home and go to sleep.

But Marcus doesn't want to just take Jeff home. What he wants to do - what his body is telling him he needs to do - is take Jeff back to his place and put Jeff into his bed, build him a nest and make that upset, distressed note in Jeff's scent disappear by burying it under his own.

It's like being punched in the gut, the realization he wants to nest with Jeff, curl up and wrap around him and make him feel safe and warm and happy. Marcus, intellectually, doesn't want to do that. He doesnt think that Jeff wants it, either. Still, it takes a lot of strength not to pull the car over and wrap himself around Jeff right then.

He pulls up in front of Jeff's house and hits his hazard lights again.

"See you tomorrow," Marcus says, watching Jeff as he all but flings himself out of the car like he's trying to get away from Marcus. 

"Thanks," is the only thing Jeff says, and his knuckles brush across the back of Marcus's hand where it rests on the gear shift before he's getting out and slamming the car door shut behind him. Marcus watches as he goes up to the door and disappears inside.

Marcus leaves. He makes it to the end of the block before making a spur-of-the-moment left turn and then more until he's driving back down Jeff's street. He pulls into the driveway and gets out, half-jogging up to Jeff's front door.

Once he knocks, Jeff has the door open in seconds, like he was standing right beside it.

"I know you're not okay," Marcus says to him. "And I can't go home without making sure you're okay."

Jeff doesn't say anything. He doesn't have to. He just leans in and wraps his arms around Marcus, clinging to him.

And that's it. There's no way Marcus is going home, not with Jeff like this. But one of them has to take control of the situation, so Marcus pushes gently until Jeff moves backward enough to let Marcus into the house.

"Come to bed," Marcus says, and there's a tiny thread of command underneath the words. Not enough to force Jeff to obey him, but enough that Jeff is taking his hand and locking the door before leading Marcus to his bedroom.

Jeff strips out of his suit and Marcus kicks off his shoes. It's so quiet in the room that Marcus can hear Jeff breathing the entire time.

"Do you want me to strip down?" Marcus asks, putting the choice in Jeff's hands as Jeff is climbing into the bed in nothing but his underwear. To Marcus, it almost seems like if Jeff says something, he'll start crying. He just nods in response to Marcus's question.

Marcus strips down to his own underwear and climbs into the bed, pulling Jeff in close to his chest and tucking Jeff in under his chin. Jeff's scent wraps around him, almost overwhelming clinging to Jeff's pillows and sheets. Marcus has an overwhelming urge to make that scent smell more like him.

He strokes his fingers through Jeff's hair until the acrid smell of unhappiness, of being upset, in Jeff's scent goes away.

As an Alpha, Marcus has never felt the urge to purr or soothe any Omega. And he's never done it; but he _needs_ to soothe Jeff. He doesn't even realize it's happening at first. It just happens, and between his fingers in Jeff's hair and the rumble of the purr from his chest, Jeff's scent settles, becomes the scent Marcus has become familiar with, and they both fall asleep.

\-----

_Six years._

_Jeff is going to be with the Canes for six more years. At least._

_It feels like a lifetime, an eternity, and at the same time not nearly long enough._

_When his agent calls to tell him the news, that the deal is done, and Jeff is staying in Raleigh, with his team, with Eric, he can’t keep the grin from splitting his face, heart racing. It feels right. He belongs with the Canes, in a way he hasn’t ever felt he’s belonged before – not even in Kitchener, with the Rangers and Gabe._

_He can’t stop his mind from wandering then, to Eric, and he fumbles his phone out of his pocket to text him. There’s an urge, curling deep in his gut, to tell him he’s here, for the long haul. That he won’t be leaving any time soon._

__Guess you’re stuck with me for a little longer _, he taps out, sending before he can second guess himself, or the message._

_He barely has to wait until the reply comes, as though Eric was waiting._

__Dinner’s on you this time, eh? _it says, and Jeff flushes to the tips of his ears. He knows that details of his contract haven’t been made public yet, but that cool confidence that Eric has that Jeff, inevitably, was paid well gives him a thrill. He doesn’t even manage to reply before his phone buzzes in his hand with a second._

 __I’m glad you’re staying. __

 _Jeff’s mouth goes dry, and he can hear his heart thundering in his ears. It’s something Eric says to him a lot,_ stay _, with a hand on his shoulder, or low on his back, on nights out, or when they go for dinner, lunch. Jeff always does._

_And now he is again._

__Me too _, he sends back, and it feels like a promise, like they’re right on the cusp of something more. And he’s still young, he knows that, but it hardly feels important now. Not when there’s six more years on the clock._

_They have time._

\-----

Marcus wakes up the next morning with Jeff’s scent in his nostrils and Jeff nuzzling his nose along Marcus’s neck. There’s an electric jolt through his entire body when Jeff’s nose presses against his scent glands, when he can hear Jeff inhale, can feel the way his chest expands.

Scenting Marcus.

He pretends that he’s still asleep, and lets Jeff keep going. Jeff’s nose presses against Marcus’s skin. Then his mouth.

“I know you’re awake,” Jeff whispers to him, and Marcus still doesn’t move. “Tell me to stop.”

“I don’t want you to,” Marcus whispers back.

Jeff kisses him then, slips his tongue past Marcus’s lips as Marcus brings one hand up to cup around the back of Jeff’s skull, to tangle in his hair. Neither of them have brushed their teeth and all Marcus can think about is how incredible Jeff tastes.

It’s easy to let Jeff take the lead on this, because he seems to want to. Marcus already knows that Jeff hates to be commanded, so he can’t imagine trying to flip Jeff and pin him to the mattress - and Marcus isn’t that kind of guy anyway. He lets Jeff’s weight press him down, raises his other hand to rest it against Jeff’s lower back, just above the waistband of his underwear.

Jeff is hard, pressed up against him, but Marcus won’t do anything until Jeff takes it further. He doesn’t want it to feel like he’s taking advantage - because he does have an advantage, being the Alpha in this situation. But Jeff seems content to lie with most of his weight on top of Marcus, just kissing him, and Marcus is okay with that.

He’s just starting to grind his hips down against Marcus’s when the alarm starts going off on his phone. Jeff ducks his head down to hide it in the crook of Marcus’s neck instead of turning off the noise, and Marcus sighs.

“I need to run home before practice,” he tells Jeff. He can’t roll up to practice in the sweatpants he usually bums around his house in.

“Okay,” Jeff says, but doesn’t move.

“Jeff,” Marcus says. It’s not a command.

“Five more minutes,” Jeff says.

“Turn off the alarm and get out of bed,” Marcus says with a sigh. “Or at least roll off so I can get up. I have to go home and get clothes.”

Jeff kisses him once more, twice more, then rolls off of him and stops the alarm before getting out of bed. Marcus sits up, and realizes that Jeff has actually started grabbing Marcus’s stuff. There’s a darker spot on the fabric of his underwear where slick has soaked through, and the sight makes Marcus’s dick twitch. When Jeff offers Marcus his clothes, Marcus tugs Jeff between his knees at the edge of the bed and kisses him again.

“You could come over to mine after practice,” Marcus suggests. He can feel his cheeks go hot, blushing at the idea of propositioning a teammate. An Omega.

Jeff smiles at him, his lips swollen and the skin around his mouth scraped raw by Marcus’s beard.

“Come on,” Jeff says. “Get dressed so you can go home and get dressed. And so I can go jerk off in the shower because you don’t have time to do it for me.”

“Believe me, if I didn’t need to go home, I would,” Marcus tells him. He pulls Jeff closer, and he knows he’s never going to get out of there if he lets Jeff keep kissing him, and then he’s going to be late to practice. But Jeff _is_ kissing him and he can’t help but glide his hands down over Jeff’s ass, until his fingers brush over the wet place where it’s obvious that Jeff’s an Omega and he’s into this, pressing his body harder against Marcus.

“Get out, get out,” Jeff says, pulling out of Marcus’s arms. “Put your clothes on and get out.”

Marcus laughs and does what he’s told, and Jeff walks him to the door, pressing up against him again to kiss him more.

The only reason Marcus isn’t late for practice is because he breaks several traffic laws on the way there.

\-----

_The second that Erskine puts his hands on Eric, Jeff sees red. He’s not even thinking as Eric pushes Erskine back, already skating into the rapidly escalating scrum, Jordan and the rest of the team following close behind him._

_What happens next is sheer adrenaline and confusion. Jeff is caught in a headlock for one terrifying moment, and he flails his arm out to try and get free, his breathing constricted and vision obscured. Once he manages to struggle free, he’s disoriented, swinging through the press of bodies for the nearest Capitals jersey, not really caring who that is._

_Which is why he flinches back when a rogue punch comes flying out of nowhere, mostly missing him, before steady hands follow, gripping tight at the back of his collar and dragging him down and down and down. The scent is without a doubt that of an alpha, and everything inside him is screaming to submit as he’s held firm in place._

_Jeff doesn’t submit._

_He wraps a hand around the back of the alpha’s knee, tugging hard to throw him off balance and land a rising punch of his own. There’s a flash of black and white then, the refs trying to intervene, but it only adds to the chaos._

_Jeff loses his helmet as the alpha goes down, the two of them spinning rapidly out of control, as the refs finally,_ finally _, manage to tear them apart. Not without Jeff making a valiant attempt to go back at him. Johansson._

_He’s skated towards the box, every single nerve ending on fire, curls damp and clinging to his forehead. Jeff gulps in deep breaths in an attempt to calm himself, as he continues to ignore his Omega instincts. At least his knees didn’t hit the ice first._

_Jeff steals a glance at Johansson, his hair loose and wild, having also lost his helmet while they were swinging blind fists at each other. His stomach swoops uneasily with a feeling he can’t quite place._

_Maybe it’s guilt, he thinks, as he drops with a thud to the bench. He hadn’t looked back once for Eric, to check that he was okay._

_Jeff isn’t sure what to do with that._

\-----

They don’t go back to Marcus’s place after practice.

It happens like this: Marcus drags into practice almost late and scrambles into his gear and makes it onto the ice in time to overhear Eichs talking about some new restaurant that he wants to go to. And then the conversation spreads to include more and more of the guys, and suddenly they’re all going to dinner and it’s team building and Marcus is an assistant captain, so he can’t weasel out of it without looking like a huge asshole no matter how much it feels like his balls match his breezers.

He’s a little irritable about the whole situation, and Jeff catches his eye from several seats down and across the table at dinner and gives him a wide-eyed, desperate look, so at the very least he’s not the only one who’s horny as fuck.

Of course, the next problem is that the day after they have a game, and they’re flying out right after. So Jeff can’t go home with Marcus, and they could have a quick hookup, but that seems unfair, and - 

They’re in California and they’re definitely not having sex, and it’s all Marcus can think about. He feels sorry for the maids cleaning his room because he’s having incredibly intense dreams about _knotting Jeff_ \- and frankly, he hasn’t had dreams about things like that since he first presented, so it’s irritating to wake up with come all over him.

Every night Jeff is down the hall and Marcus lies in bed, thinking about him. Thinking about getting up and going down the hallway and knocking, pressing his nose against Jeff’s scent glands, pinning him down to the bed and - Marcus has to stop thinking about it.

They’re out at dinner in Los Angeles when it comes up. Marcus isn’t even paying any attention at first, until he hears Eichel sing-song, “somebody got a knot.”

“Fuck off,” says Mittlestadt, but he’s blushing furiously, sitting across the table from Eichel.

“Look, we’ve all done it or had it done to us,” Eichel says. “But you’re fuckin’ pleased.”

Mittlestadt murmurs something that Marcus can’t hear, and Eichel barks out a laugh. “You’re a man now,” Eichel says.

Mittlestadt blushes even more.

“Everyone’s done it, dude,” Eichel says. “I was nineteen when I knotted someone for the first time. It’s a rite of passage.”

“I was too,” Risto offers.

“I was playing in the SHL,” Marcus offers. He doesn’t mention that he was a late bloomer and it was during the lockout. His teammates don’t need to know that, and his cheeks are hot anyway. He flicks his eyes over to where Jeff is sitting.

“What about you, Skins?” Eichel asks eventually, noticing that Jeff hasn’t volunteered any information, when everyone else, even Dahlin, has.

“I,” Jeff says, and Marcus watches him swallow hard. “I’ve never - you know. I’ve never been knotted.”

The table turns into an uproar of people shouting their disbelief. Marcus doesn’t say anything, but he can’t tear his eyes away from Jeff. Now that he knows Jeff’s never been knotted - watching his red, red face, feeling the embarrassment rolling off of him in waves - he wants to be the one to change it.

“You gotta get it,” Eichel says. “You’re missing out.”

Even with all the different scents in the room, Marcus is sure he can pick out Jeff, the thread of his embarrassment. Jeff meets Marcus’s eyes across the table.

It’s a coincidence when they end up in the hotel elevator together, alone. The second Marcus steps into the elevator, he can smell Jeff’s arousal, the undercurrent of his embarrassment.

“You know,” Marcus says, his voice quiet. He’s not looking at Jeff, breathing shallow so he doesn’t take in too much of Jeff’s scent, Jeff’s arousal. “I could … help you out.”

“With what,” Jeff says. Marcus is pretty sure that Jeff knows exactly what he means.

“Knotting you for the first time,” Marcus says. He’s blushing, too.

“On the road,” Jeff says, his voice flat.

“No, I -,” Marcus starts. “Not on the road. I want - I don’t want anyone to hear you scream.”

“What makes you think I’m going to scream,” Jeff says. The elevator is creeping closer to their floor.

“It’s no fun if the knot doesn’t make you scream,” Marcus says.

“I’m not going to scream,” Jeff says.

“Sounds like a challenge,” Marcus tells him. The doors ding open and they’re both breathing hard. Marcus’s heartbeat is pounding in his ears.

He and Jeff are in rooms right next to each other, one thin wall between them. It’s tempting to just go into Jeff’s room with him, but he stops himself. Jeff deserves better than being knotted on the road in the sterility of a hotel room. Marcus wants to do it at home, with Jeff in his bed, where Marcus’s scent permeates everything.

He wants to make Jeff his, and he hates himself for the possessiveness.

He jerks off alone, then, and he’d swear he can smell Jeff, smell his arousal, even though the wall separates the two of them. He knows what it smells like, and inside the sterile detergent scent in his hotel room, it stands out. His vision goes a little dark around the edges as he comes in his own hand.

He’s not going to survive this road trip.

\-----

_Jeff is feeling pretty keyed up still, two days later, when the Canes are back home after that shitshow in Washington._

_They’re already down a goal against the Bruins and Jeff just can’t keep still, his leg jittering as he tracks the puck up and down the ice. There’s a flush high on his cheeks, one that he hasn’t been able to budge. The guys had chirped him mercilessly for it in the locker room, as though he hasn’t already heard every colorful variation of him looking ‘cherubic’ since juniors._

_He doesn’t startle when a gloved hand squeezes his knee, but it’s a close thing. “You’re up,” Eric says, and at least Jeff will have something to focus on, as the lines change and he goes over the boards._

_The rest of the game comes and goes in bursts. Jeff scores a beauty on the powerplay before they’re out of the first period, but he’s radiating heat like a goddamn furnace, unable to stop his mind from wandering and needing his teammates to snap him back to attention._

_By the time they’re leaving the ice, a four-two win under their belts, he’s practically soaked through all of his gear, and his heart rate is elevated beyond normal post-game exertion levels._

_His hands are shaking as he strips down, the conversation around him nothing but a steady hum of noise, until one voice cuts through it, clear as a bell._

_“Jeff,” Eric says, hands cradling his face, and that touch is like a sudden gulp of cool water after wandering parched through the desert. “Hey there. Eyes on me, bud. C’mon, look up.”_

_Jeff does, his vision hazy around the edges, as he tries to quirk a reassuring smile at Eric. With the way Eric’s lips turn down in return, he’s not sure that it works, and a frisson of panic courses along his spine. He doesn’t want to disappoint anyone. He’s not sure what he did wrong, or how to fix it._

_Eric’s thumb traces the line of his jaw, and Jeff is about to lean all the way into that touch, when it’s taken away just as suddenly. Eric is ushered across the room, Cam whispering furiously under his breath, fingers circled in a tight grip around his wrist._

_“Okay, you’re coming home with me,” one of the trainers is saying, another Omega, and Jeff just nods along, tipping his weight against them when they wrap an arm securely around his waist. He doesn’t catch all that’s being said around him, but he does hear ‘flash heat,’ and everything clicks into place._

_He’s not sure what triggered it, exactly, but at least it’s nothing too serious. It’ll burn out about as quickly as it started and he’ll be back on the ice by the time they need to leave for Ottawa._

_Jeff catches Eric’s eye as he’s guided out of the locker room, before the media arrive for the postgame scrum. He doesn’t know what to make of the look in them, or the way Eric is worrying his lip between his teeth, the hissed Eric from Cam, ramrod still at his side._

_But then he’s hit with a wall of frigid air as he’s led into the corridor, and any thought beyond the pressing need to break his heat slips away._

\-----

When they get back to Buffalo, Jeff follows Marcus home from the airport. He parks shitty and crooked in the driveway and has his coat off by the time they get through the door from the garage and into Marcus’s kitchen.

“Take your clothes off,” he tells Marcus, and Marcus briefly thinks that Jeff would have been a great Alpha if that had been how he’d presented.

Marcus shrugs out of his coat and leaves it across the back of a chair, and Jeff is on him before he can do anything else, his fingers wrapping in the collar of Marcus’s shirt and covering Marcus’s mouth with his. It’s not exactly conducive to Marcus taking his clothes off, but he’s not complaining.

Jeff is pushy, tugging at Marcus’s clothes, pushing him backward toward the kitchen doorway. Marcus catches Jeff’s wrists, gives them a squeeze, and tries to take control of the situation, kissing Jeff slower until Jeff starts to struggle under his hands.

“Take me to _bed_ ,” Jeff tells him, tugging his hands out of Marcus’s to reach for the buttons on Marcus’s pants. Marcus pulls back, grabs hold of Jeff’s hand and tugs him out of the kitchen and down the hallway.

Jeff almost stumbles kicking out of his pants, leaving them discarded on Marcus’s bedroom floor. Marcus catches a glimpse of where slick is already soaking through the back of Jeff’s shorts just before he drops them onto Marcus’s floor, and Marcus has to take a second to press the heel of his hand against his cock just to clear his mind.

Marcus fumbles out of his own clothes and crowds Jeff back toward the bed, dropping his head down to scent Jeff. He breathes in the way Jeff smells until it’s all there is and he feels a little dizzy, between Jeff’s regular scent and the sharp spice of his arousal as he goes easily to the mattress underneath Marcus’s body.

Jeff’s mouth is aggressive on his, his hands tangling in Marcus’s hair to tug him down so that Jeff can press his nose against Marcus’s neck, scent him and dig his teeth in. Marcus is sure that Jeff is leaving a mark, but he can’t care because it feels incredible.

He gets a hand between them, between Jeff’s thighs, already able to feel the warm, wet slick leaking out. Jeff takes two fingers easily, Marcus’s fingers sinking into his hot, wet Omega, pinned underneath him.

“Come on, just fuck me,” Jeff says, bearing down on Marcus’s fingers, trying to get more. “You can do the foreplay later.”

“Just let me - “ Marcus starts, but Jeff makes a noise of protest underneath him. Jeff shifts, pushes at Marcus.

“Fuck. Me,” Jeff says, determined, and Marcus lets Jeff switch their positions, lets Jeff pin him down to the bed. He’s never had an Omega pin him before - he’s never hooked up with that many Omegas, really - but he likes it.

Jeff is in control now, pinning Marcus to the mattress, digging his teeth into the skin above Marcus’s pulse as he sinks down on Marcus’s cock. He makes a tiny little whimper noise that he tries to muffle with his mouth against Marcus’s neck. Marcus is pretty sure he’s seeing stars, because it’s been so long since he’s even gotten laid, much less been with an Omega, and he’s spent the last couple of weeks aching to fuck Jeff.

He’s trying to think about other things, anything he can think of to keep from embarrassing himself because he wants this to be good for Jeff so badly. Jeff’s got his eyes closed, one hand braced on the mattress and one hand wrapped around his cock as he grinds down onto Marcus.

“Jeff,” Marcus says, because he can’t hold out, no matter how badly he wants to.

Jeff yelps when Marcus knots him. He stops moving because he has to, and he sits astride Marcus’s hips and jerks himself off, coming with a gasp across Marcus’s chest.

Marcus shifts them onto their sides and drapes an arm around Jeff. They’re both breathing hard, and Jeff presses his fingers against the place he bit Marcus’s neck, like he’s trying to make the bruise worse.

“Told you I’d make you scream,” Marcus says to him, stroking slow circles on Jeff’s lower back. Jeff makes an indignant noise.

“I didn’t scream,” Jeff says.

“Keep telling yourself that,” Marcus tells him. They’re quiet for a while, still locked together by Marcus’s knot. Jeff’s fingers stroke through Marcus’s hair absently.

“Is it always like this?” Jeff asks.

“No,” Marcus tells him. “I can do better.”

Jeff giggles and presses his face against Marcus’s chest.

\-----

_Jeff knows, the second the puck hits his tape, that he’s going to score. Something about this game just felt right from the moment he stepped out onto the ice, and there isn’t a moment of hesitation in him as he buries the puck behind Grubauer for his third of the night._

_The reaction from the crowd isn’t anything like it would be back in Raleigh, but a hatty is a hatty, made even better by being the game winner in overtime. He feels lit up from the inside out, adrenaline pumping as the team crowds him against the boards._

_It doesn’t take long before Eric finds him on the ice, fingers curling tight into Jeff’s jersey, anchoring them together, like he can’t stand to be far away from him in that moment. Jeff’s adrenaline spikes even higher._

_“That’s what I’m fucking talking about,” Eric shouts over the constant thrum of noise surrounding them. He bumps his helmet against Jeff’s, as soon as he’s drawn in close enough, and Jeff’s heart feels like it just skipped a beat. “That’s my boy.”_

_Those words might as well be a brand on his skin, and Jeff feels himself going hot all over. He’s about to open his mouth to reply, words caught in his throat a little, before Cam interjects, dragging Jeff in and breaking Eric’s tight-fisted hold on him._

_“Good job, kid,” Cam says, rapping his knuckles on the top of Jeff’s lid. Eric’s lips press into a firm line. Jeff can’t help but wonder, for a moment, if that look is betraying Eric’s instincts._

_Jeff is twenty-one now. Still young, but not so young that a claim would be unheard of. Jeff wishes that Eric would. He feels as though he’s been waiting for an eternity for Eric to make his next move._

_“Thanks,” is what he says, grin still blinding, even with the curl of disappointment settled low in his gut._

_They’ve still got time, after all._

\-----

He’s not flaunting it, but it’s hard to hide the marks on his body when he has to strip down for practice two days later. He could change somewhere else, but there’s a bruise around a bite mark pretty high up on his neck that’s hidden by his sweatshirt, but when he takes it off, it’s there for everyone to see.

There’s no way for anyone to know that they’re Jeff’s teeth. Except there are scratches all the way down his back and Jeff’s got a hickey on his collarbone and bite marks around his nipple when he takes his shirt off.

At least the bruises on Jeff’s ass and thighs aren’t visible. Marcus knows they’re there.

He put them there.

He has to look away from Jeff because he starts blushing, and once he gets started he can’t stop, and someone whistles. His face is on fire and he can’t get dressed quickly enough.

“Damn,” someone says. “Someone had a hell of a day off.”

“Skinny, you finally get that knot?” someone else yells, and Jeff slaps a hand up over the bite on his chest, but seems to forget about the one on his neck.

“Looks like he’s not the only one,” a third teammate chimes in, and heads swivel to look at Marcus, who can’t turn himself invisible to sprint out of the room. He wants to.

“What a coincidence,” Eichel says quietly to no one in particular, looking at Marcus. Marcus meets his eyes and shakes his head. Eichel narrows his eyes, but doesn’t say anything else.

Marcus flees to the safety of the rink.

It’s not until later that Eichel catches him on the faceoff dot, gliding up under the guise of practicing faceoffs with Marcus. There’s no easy way for Marcus to get out of it, so he just bends down and tries to swipe Eichel’s stick out of the way as one of the coaches tosses pucks down for them

“Be careful with him,” is what Eichel says to him. His voice is quiet and the racket of the practice around him makes it almost like no one else could overhear them. Their sticks clack together and Marcus looks at him, confused. “Other Alphas have been shitty to him.”

“I’m not - “ Marcus starts.

Eichel shoves at Marcus before Marcus can finish the conversation.

“I don’t care if you do it,” he says, once they’re stopped by the bench. “I’m just saying. He’s not, y’know, a traditional Omega. So Alphas don’t want him.”

Marcus shakes his head. “We’re not - “

“I’m not stupid, dude,” Eichel tells him. “Like I said, I don’t care. But if you expect him to be traditional, that’s not him.”

Marcus takes a deep breath and exhales through his nose. “Well, then maybe we’re perfect for each other,” he says, without thinking about it. Both of Eichel’s eyebrows go up, and Marcus flees down the tunnel to the locker room.

\-----

_It’s only the preseason, but there’s something about facing down Washington that gets Jeff’s blood pumping. He wants to push himself further, battle harder, to feel the bone-deep satisfaction of a game well won._

_He’s in the corner, digging for the puck in the offensive zone, when he turns and-- well. Jeff doesn’t even have time to react before he’s rattled by an elbow to his face, and he’s going down, down, down, black creeping in from the edge of his vision._

_Panic bubbles in the pit of his stomach. Jeff can’t afford another concussion, not with the regular season just in reach, and Jordan out for god knows how long with a broken leg._

_Whether by sheer power of will or some kind of miracle Jeff does not pass out. He even manages to push himself back onto his skates, albeit a little unsteadily. He dropped his stick at some point and he knows that he needs to pick it back up, it feels really important to pick it up, but when he bends down to collect it the ice comes at him in a rush, and nausea washes over him like a wave._

_“Let’s get you off the ice, Skinner,” a ref says, and there’s an arm at his elbow, solid, guiding him to the bench. While he’d usually protest, Jeff is thankful for it, as he teeters dangerously once he’s within touching distance of the gate._

_What comes next is something that Jeff is more familiar with than he would like. He’s ushered into a quiet room, while the team doctors put him through concussion protocol, but he doesn’t need them to give him the final verdict. He already knows. It doesn’t make it any easier to swallow, of course. And he can give Peters all the platitudes in the world, but there is no way he’ll be back on the ice for the season opener._

_He knows that he shouldn’t be looking at the screen of his phone, once he’s back at the hotel, curled up on his side in bed, caught between feeling sorry for himself and the thrum of fury prickling under his skin. If Jeff’s judgment was sound, he wouldn’t have sent a message to Eric to come and keep him company. Wouldn’t be waiting for a reply._

_It never comes._

\-----

Jeff and Eichel go to the All Star Game, and Marcus watches from a hotel room in Miami, where he and some of the other guys have fled to get away from the bitter winter cold of Buffalo.

“I think I’m coming down with something,” Marcus tells Jeff on the phone after the game, when a lot of the guys he’s with have gone out to party and he’s alone in his hotel room. Miami’s beautiful, especially compared to the cold gray of Buffalo, but he misses Jeff.

He could kick himself in the ass but he does miss Jeff.

“Is it possible to be allergic to St. Louis?” Jeff asks him on the same call. “I have this like - it’s your sinuses when your headache is like, right behind your eyes, right? Right in the middle of my face.”

“Well, at least you can still party,” Marcus tells him. “I ate room service on my hotel balcony because I didn’t feel like going out.”

“Sucks,” Jeff says. “Get better before I come home.”

Marcus laughs at him. “I’ll try. Have fun partying with the All Stars,” he tells Jeff, and they hang up.

In the morning, Marcus feels even shittier and he texts the group chat to let them know to go do whatever and not worry about him. So now he’s staying in bed in his hotel room, on vacation, coming down with a cold. His head is pounding and he just wants to call and talk to Jeff, but Jeff has shit to do and he’s not feeling well either.

“I don’t think you should come over when you get back,” Marcus says, once he’s back in his own bed in Buffalo, curled up under his covers. He’s wrapped himself up in a dirty sweatshirt Jeff’s left in his car, and burying his face in it is actually somehow easing the ache in his head.

“Why not?” Jeff asks. “I want to see you.”

“Because I don’t want you to catch whatever I’ve got,” Marcus tells him.

Jeff sighs. “Fine,” he says. “But I’ll see you at practice tomorrow?”

“Unless I die,” Marcus says, and Jeff is laughing as he hangs up.

Marcus throws his phone onto the mattress next to him, and curls up to go to sleep. The last thing he expects is for the doorbell to startle him out of sleep. He has no idea who could be at his house, and he can’t remember if he’s supposed to get any deliveries.

He lays there for a minute, until the doorbell rings again. Then he gets up and makes his way downstairs. And when he looks through the peep-hole, he sees Eichel.

“What the fuck?” he asks, tugging the door open.

“Jeff missed you,” Eichel says. He gives Jeff a shove in the back, pushing him toward Marcus. “And I think the two of you need to spend some time together so we can all get back to normal and push for the playoffs.”

“I don’t want him to get sick,” Marcus protests.

“Just - “ Eichel says. “Fucking figure it out.”

He turns and walks back down the steps to his waiting car.

“I promise I won’t get sick,” Jeff says, even as he’s pushing the door shut behind him and pushing his body against Marcus’s. He’s definitely going to catch whatever Marcus has.

Marcus doesn’t think any more about it, because Jeff’s mouth is warm and wet and by the time Marcus gets him into the bedroom, so is the rest of him. They fall asleep locked together, Jeff’s leg hooked over Marcus’s hip.

In the morning, he feels fine - like he never felt sick at all. Jeff’s allergies are cleared up, and they grab coffee on the way to the rink - together.

\-----

_It’s by some small miracle that Jeff is cleared to play after sitting out just three games. He’s being held out of a fourth, but he’ll at least be leaving on the road-trip with the rest of the team in the morning and, barring any potential setbacks, get back into the lineup against Winnipeg. All things told, he’s considering it a win._

_His head is feeling clear enough that Faulk manages to convince him to join the team for a few drinks. Jeff has never really been big on the partying scene, preferring to keep as much of his private life private as he can, but Faulk promises it’s going to be pretty low-key, so he agrees._

_The place is pretty deserted, which isn’t that surprising considering it’s a weekday, and he’s mostly been nursing the same drink since he arrived. A few of the guys haven’t arrived yet, including Eric, but it’s still early yet. And some of them have families now and can’t always get away. At least, not right before a long roadie._

_He hasn’t seen most of the team since he went down against Washington, the trainers skating him before practice to reduce any contact or excess noise, but a couple of games were also on the road. It’ll be good to see them, even briefly. The lights might not be irritating him, but he doesn’t want to push himself too much and backslide his recovery._

_Jeff is only half listening to the conversation between Faulk and Cam, smiling and nodding along, when he catches the edge of a familiar scent. Cam trails off for a moment, and gives Jeff a sidelong look that he can’t quite place, lips drawn into a line, but not quite managing a frown._

_He looks up and, as expected, Eric has arrived, Jordan flanking him on one side, and a woman he doesn’t recognize on the other. There’s a knot in his stomach, pulling tighter and tighter. Eric’s hand is settled low against her back, protective, and she’s tucked in close, barely a sliver of space between their bodies. She’s unmistakably an Omega, and she smells like Eric._

_Eric is avoiding looking at him. Everyone else is waiting, silent, for the introductions. But Jeff knows, before Eric even opens his mouth, who she is. They all do._

_“Guys, this is Liv,” Eric says, and her smile is bright. Liv is beautiful, with gently curling golden hair falling around her shoulders, and she’s glowing. Anyone would, though, with Eric’s attention focused entirely on them. “We’re-- well. We bonded.”_

_Jeff is jostled slightly in the uproar from everyone else, as they all rush to stand and congratulate him. He doesn’t meet Cam’s eyes, even though he knows he’s being considered for his reaction. He may be twenty-two, still young, but he’s not about to lose it in the middle of a bar in Carolina, over what is – for lack of a way to put it delicately – the most public way he could have possibly been rejected by an alpha._

_He sets his glass down, to hide the fact that his hands are shaking, the liquid sloshing dangerously against the edges, threatening to tip over the rim. Jeff is almost thankful that he can use his concussion as an excuse to head out early._

_“-- yeah, we’ve been together since the summer,” Eric is saying, when Jeff stands to at least give his congratulations. “We’re expecting.”_

_If learning that Eric is bonded to someone else made the world slip out from underneath his feet, that they are having a child makes him shut down even further. Jeff is going through the motions when he tells them how happy he is for them, that Eric is going to be an incredible father, but he’s beat. He’s going to head out and get some rest before the road-trip. He’s fine. He’s absolutely fine. Just his head--_

_He doesn’t bother to spare a glance at Jordan or Cam as he leaves, can feel his phone buzzing, insistent, in his pocket, as he walks straight out the door. He leaves his jacket in coat check. It doesn’t seem important any more. Jeff hails the first taxi he sees, rattling off his address, barely holding himself together, but he manages._

_He manages right up until his door closes with a snick behind him._

_Until he sinks down to the floor, and cries, and cries, and cries._

\-----

The game is a shitshow.

It’s chippy from the jump, and it feels like everyone is taking stupid penalties. Marcus knows he’s going to be hoarse after, from yelling - from yelling at Bruins, from yelling at his linemates, from trying to get things under control.

And that’s before Jeff gets slammed into the boards.

Jeff is tough, and Jeff can take a beating. But Jeff has a concussion history just as bad as Marcus’s, so when he crumples to the ice after being slammed into a wall and then doesn't move, Marcus fucking loses it.

He’s never had a fighting major in his life, but he takes one swinging at a Bruin whose name he doesn’t know and whose number he doesn’t remember in the aftermath. He was a Bruin - but this must be someone called up, someone they traded for. That, or everything competent leaves his brain once his Omega is lying on the ice.

The last thing he means to do is put his team down another man when Jeff is already gone to the quiet room by the time Marcus is being sent down the tunnel, but he can’t help it, and it’s too late besides by the time the overwhelming feeling of rage dissipates and he’s able to think more clearly.

He’s not ejected, which is good because most likely Jeff isn’t coming back out. But he’s got ten minutes and the intermission to think about what he did. What he did that was super out of character for who he is. But it’s not that out of character for someone that he’s close to and - 

Everything suddenly clicks into place. Why he reacted the way he did to Jeff getting run, why he was sick when Jeff was at the All-Star Game - why Jeff was sick, too.

They bonded. They bonded and neither of them even noticed. But Eichel must have - he must have figured it out, somehow, and that was why he brought Jeff to Marcus the night they came back from the ASG. He’d known that neither of them were really sick, they were just bondsick. They needed each other.

Marcus knows that he’s not supposed to go into the quiet room, because Jeff is getting checked by trainers. But he thinks they’re outside of normal circumstances right now. When he opens the door, Jeff is sitting on the table, his feet dangling, his skates still on. The trainers are shining a light in his eyes, and he’s answering their questions. Marcus doesn’t interrupt, but it takes a lot of willpower not to.

If their situations were reversed, Marcus knows that Jeff would interrupt, because that’s what Marcus _wants_ to do. But that’s not Marcus’s instinct. That act-first-think-later attitude isn’t Marcus, it’s Jeff. And Marcus thinks back and can’t figure out when it happened, and he just knows that it was at least before the All Star Break.

Jeff looks up at him, and then he starts to get down off the table.

“I don’t think so, bud,” the trainer tells him. “You’re not done yet.”

Marcus has to wait, leaned in the doorway, while the trainers finish up. They don’t seem to think Jeff is concussed, and Marcus knows that if Jeff isn’t concussed, he’s going to be determined to go back out on the ice. Marcus gets it, he’s been concussed.

They tell him they’re going to come back and do some more tests, but they want him to take ten minutes and sit in the quiet. There’s time. The period isn’t quite over, and then they have the intermission.

“You’re not hurt,” Jeff says, confused, looking at Marcus as the trainers close the door and leave the two of them alone. He frowns for a second, then his whole face changes and his voice rises in pitch as he says, “you got kicked out?”

Marcus can’t help but smile at him. “Just. Sent to cool off,” Marcus says.

“You don’t fight,” Jeff says, confused.

“You do,” Marcus says. He doesn’t know if Jeff is going to pick up what he’s saying without coming out and saying it.

“Yeah but - “ Jeff says, and he scrunches his whole face up. “You’ve never even gotten five before.”

Marcus sighs, steps forward and wraps his arms around Jeff. They’re both sweaty and rank from playing. Marcus feels the shift of Jeff’s body as he inhales, in spite of knowing that they’re disgusting. Marcus doesn’t know how he didn’t notice before that they’d bonded; no person outside a bond would think their partner smelled this good in this state.

“I’m getting a little bleed over,” Marcus says. “From you.”

Jeff’s head snaps up and he looks at Marcus. “What?” he says.

“I’m pretty sure we - I’m pretty sure we’re bonded,” Marcus says. “I don’t know why I didn’t - why we didn’t notice before.”

“Bonded,” Jeff says, his voice faint.

“I’m sorry if you don’t want it,” Marcus says. Jeff grabs a fist full of Marcus’s under-armor.

“I want it,” he says.

“I’m sorry I didn’t court you,” Marcus says.

“I don’t _care_ ,” Jeff says, and tugs Marcus down by his shirt, jamming their mouths together. It’s disgusting and perfect.

They break apart when the trainer comes in.

“Well don’t fuckin’ do that,” the trainer says to them. He walks over and starts to nudge Marcus out of the way. “Get out of here, Jojo. Do that on your own time.”

Marcus has the grace to blush. “Sorry. Sorry,” he says. He thinks about telling the trainer that he and Jeff are bonded, because he’s overwhelmed with the thought. Probably the trainer doesn’t care.

“Go,” the trainer says, giving him a push toward the door.

Eichel swoops down on him when he gets back into the locker room proper. “What the fuck dude,” he asks, staring at Marcus. “Of all the fucking times for you to lose your shit - “

“You knew,” Marcus says, interrupting him. “You brought him to my house that night because you knew.”

“Fucking _finally,_ ” Eichel hollers, throwing up his hands.

“You could have said!” Marcus says.

“And miss all the fun of the two of you being fucking idiots?” Eichel asks. “We can talk about this later but I need you to go out there and play like you want to win this game or I am going to punch you in the face myself.”

That’s probably fair, Marcus thinks. He fucked up big time, even if it’s not strictly his fault.

\-----

_To say that Jeff has been off his game would be an understatement. His slump is weighing him down like an anchor, the chains tight around his neck, suffocating him whenever he steps out onto the ice. Every time Jeff thinks he might be able to break the surface, he’s dragged back under; his passes never quite connecting, his shots going wide, his turnovers brutal._

_Jeff’s not sure that it even qualifies as a slump any more. Can it, if the sharp decline in his play has extended into this season from the last? If it stalked him through his off-season training._

_He knows what the media are saying. It’s near impossible to ignore. There are no excuses they can find to explain why Jeff has morphed from a thirty-goal scorer to, well, barely a fourth line plug seemingly overnight. And sure, they can pin at least some of it on his repeated head injuries, but Jeff can only coast so far on their sympathies before the “t” word starts getting thrown around._

_Though Jeff knows that it is too late for that. His value as a Calder winner, a first-round pick, the youngest player to ever make the All-Star Game, it all means nothing now. What Carolina could get for him would be paltry and nothing close to what they need. And what they need is for Jeff to be what he was._

_Before._

_That’s easier said than done, of course, when you can barely look at some of your teammates without some kind of sick, clawing feeling tearing you up from the inside out. Can’t help but keep wondering if they knew, the whole time, and why, why, why--_

_When Eric speaks to him now, as his Captain and only his Captain, Jeff looks right past him. The words barely even register with him, well-meaning encouragement that seems more rote than sincere. Jeff keeps his eyes trained at a spot on the wall over Eric’s shoulder. It’s the only way he can stop himself from shaking apart under his careful gaze._

_Eric doesn’t dare to touch him. He keeps a wide berth, unless it’s necessary for them to interact. And even then, it’s perfunctory, professional. Any semblance of the warmth and closeness they once had is gone, as though it had never even existed in the first place._

_Jeff wonders, when he’s left alone with his deepest, darkest thoughts at night, whether there is a universe where this ended differently. If there’s a version of him somewhere, out there, that is happy and contented and loved. A world where Jeff and Eric were inevitable._

_But when Eric holds his beautiful, blonde son, cradled in the safety of his arms, and looks down at him as something wholly precious and loved, Jeff knows that he was never really a choice. Eric was always going to find his way to this moment, to Liv and his son, to a life that seems tailor made for him. Perfect for Eric, in a way Jeff wasn’t and couldn’t ever be._

_So Jeff holds his breath and waits for the call from his agent. It’s only a matter of time, after all, until the Canes ask him to waive his no-movement clause. That, Jeff thinks, is the only inevitability now._

_The call never comes._

_It’s barely ninety minutes before they’re due to hit the ice against St. Louis when the rest of Jeff’s world crumbles away beneath his feet. When he looks down at his phone and the clinical headline from the NHL app stares back at him._

__

_****_ **Carolina Hurricanes captain Eric Staal traded to New York Rangers**

__

_Jeff is expected to play after that. They all are. They’ll need to address the move with the media, speak through them to reach out to the fans, give them some semblance of platitudes for a decision far beyond their control. Jeff thinks that it should have been him. Can hardly believe that it wasn’t._

_That Jeff manages a goal and an assist in just over four minutes of ice time is nothing short of a miracle. It also feels like some kind of divine punishment, thrusting him into the spotlight first. Making him wholly responsible for driving the media narrative from the perspective of the players. Not Jordan. Not Cam. Jeff._

_“Obviously, it’s tough,” Jeff says, scrambling for something, anything to say. He doesn’t have time to think. Can only hope that the weeks and months of strain on his battered heart don’t come flowing out of him. “He’s meant a lot to this organization. He’s meant a lot to guys, personally. He’s meant a lot to me. It’s always tough. That’s the way it is, that’s the business we play in.”_

_It’s like they smell blood in the water, after that, and they press just a little harder, hoping for more to rush out of him. It’s only an intermission interview, brief, but it works. God help him, it works._

_“Eric, I think for me, being here six years, he’s the only Captain I’ve ever had,” he barely hears himself speaking over the rush of blood in his ears, and the words just keep coming. “He’s been a huge part of my career. Like you say, he’s a great person. I think you won’t really meet a better guy in the game.”_

_When they finally let him go, as he tugs off the headset and stumbles back into the locker room, he’s operating on automatic._

_If anyone hears him throwing up in one of the bathroom stalls, they don’t say a damn word._

\-----

They win.

Jeff doesn’t get cleared to go back out, and as the team goes to file out, he grabs hold of Marcus and says to him, “go fuckin’ win this game.”

And Marcus does. He plays through a solid minute and a half of an overtime power play until he finally gets it past Rask, and he’s got fucking nothing left. He’s being hugged and bopped on the head and he’s just trying to keep his feet moving because if he stops he might die from the sheer exhaustion of it all.

And Eichel has the nerve to come sit in the stall next to him after media, after everyone’s showering and heading out and say, “let’s go get a drink.”

“Are you kidding me?” Marcus asks him.

“No,” Eichel says. “We can just go back to your place if you want. You know, so once we’re done with our little talk you can get your bondmate right into bed.”

Marcus wore red for the first eight and a half seasons of his career and now he’s blushing hard enough that he’d blend with any good Devils or Capitals jersey.

Eichel gives him an innocent face like he didn’t say something absolutely horrible. “What?” he asks, fake innocent. “It’s good for the bond.” Marcus must make some kind of face, because Eichel continues. “I _have_ a bondmate, you know. The more time you spend together in your early days, the stronger the bond, and the less likely you are to get bondsick. But everyone does when they’re separated at the beginning.”

“Please stop talking to me like you know things,” Marcus says. He could not feel more exhausted.

“Get dressed! I want to talk about how stupid the two of you are,” Eichel says.

They end the night sitting in Marcus’s living room, a bottle of wine open on the coffee table. Jeff is curled up next to Marcus, pressed against him like he never wants to be separated again. Eichel sprawls in an armchair like he owns the place, his shoes off and his socked feet propped up on the edge of the couch.

“I thought you’d figure it out after you woke up the morning after the All Star Break and neither of you were sick anymore,” Eichel says to them. “But I guess that was too subtle.”

“Yeah, but I don’t understand when it happened,” Marcus says. “And you knew before that.”

“I suspected,” Eichel says. “The bondsickness confirmed it, but I was already pretty sure.”

“Look since you know everything about all of this, and about us, apparently,” Jeff says, “why don’t you tell us when you think it happened?”

Jeff is wearing one of Marcus’s sweatshirts, curled up tight against him. He’s not drinking, because they haven’t said he has a concussion, but they are being cautious. He has his bare feet tucked in underneath Marcus’s sweatpants-covered calves. Eichel still has on his suit pants and his shirt, unbuttoned at the throat and coat and tie discarded before he ever came into the house.

“I think you were already bonded by the first time Marcus knotted you,” Eichel says. He’s so casual about it, but Marcus flinches at the mention of his having knotted Jeff. And sure, he did it. And he’s done it quite a few times since then. But he feels like it’s such a sleazy thing to say out loud, to talk about someone’s knot.

“Please don’t talk about things that involve my dick,” Marcus finally says.

“Sorry, bud, all of this involves your dick,” Eichel says. Marcus thinks about getting up and leaving, or at least pulling his hood up over his head and tugging the strings until it covers his face and he doesn’t have to look at Eichel anymore. “I do think you had at least started before that. It probably contributed to the, uh. Markings.”

Jeff tugs his hood over his head and slumps down against Marcus like he’s going to cut him open and crawl inside him like a Tauntaun, also to get away from Eichel. It’s a great conversation to have.

“So you don’t know for sure,” Marcus says. “You just think.”

“I know that first times between newly bonded or bonding pairs can be… intense,” Eichel says. At least this time Eichel’s the one who starts to blush, and Marcus wonders briefly how Eichel knows, and if that’s from experience. He tries not to think about how Eichel’s bondmate is Connor McDavid.

“Carolina,” Jeff suddenly blurts out. He pushes his hood back and looks up at Marcus.

“What?” Marcus asks, a little confused.

“Carolina,” Jeff repeats. “I went to dinner with Jordan.”

And he’d called Marcus to pick him up. Marcus, of all the people he’s friends with on the team. He hadn’t called an Uber, he’d called Marcus. If he’d really needed a friend, wouldn’t he have called Jeff? But the draw had been there already, and -

He remembers Jeff’s knuckles brushing over the back of his hand in the car. He remembers the way he knew he had to go back, couldn’t just go home and leave Jeff alone. He remembers that urge to protect Jeff, to build him a nest, to soak Jeff in his scent and make sure that everyone knew he was safe - that he was loved.

“Oh,” Marcus says.

“What?” Eichel asks.

“We slept together,” Marcus says.

“Slept together?” Eichel asks.

“Just slept. Jeff was upset and - “ Jeff has hold of Marcus’s hand so tight that his knuckles are white.

“And you were the Alpha he needed,” Eichel says. He sits back in the chair with his glass of wine and if they were on the ice, Marcus would punch him for looking so smug.

“I didn’t know,” Marcus says. “I would have - I would have courted you, if I thought you - “ He’s looking at Jeff now.

“I don’t care,” Jeff says.

“No one ever wanted to bond with me before,” Marcus says. He can’t put a finger on quite what he’s feeling right at that moment. He doesn’t think all of the emotions are quite his, anyway.

“No one wanted to bond with me, either,” Jeff says.

“Oh my God,” Eichel says.

“I’m not good at being an Alpha,” Marcus tells him. “I mean, you know that, that’s why I keep getting bounced around and - “

“I’m a fucking terrible Omega,” Jeff says, and he’s grinning.

“I’ll court you if you want,” Marcus tells him.

“I don’t give a fuck,” Jeff says, and kisses him.

“I’ll see myself out,” Eichel says.

\-----

_Coming back to Raleigh has never felt this unsettling before._

_It’s as though Jeff has taken a misstep and can’t quite find his footing. Everything is just that little bit off. The conversations feel stilted. There’s a tension in the air that hasn’t eased, not even with a summer between them and Eric’s trade to the Rangers._

_He’s had the whole summer to reflect on just how everything fell apart so quickly. Even after Eric found Liv, had his son, it never occurred to Jeff that he would never be there. Carolina was Eric. He was in every inch of the locker room, the rink, in the friendships forged between them all. The culture was Eric’s culture. He’d built this team. They were his._

_That feeling was never going to go away. It was like a bruise, deep under Jeff’s skin, pressing down as a constant reminder of what could have been._

_Thinking about it too much, where he went wrong, what he could have done better, more, was an exercise in madness. In the end, all Jeff could do was keep his head down and train and train and train. To bounce back after the summer in a way that would put a stop to any of the whispers, the rumors. To prove them wrong. Jeff has been doing that his entire career._

_He feels all of nineteen again. Unsure and a little raw, but with none of the hope sparking under his skin. It’s as though he’s starting over again, but this time he’s expected to lead, to provide guidance for the rookies and make this team into something great. To pull them back together, when they’re flying apart._

_Six years felt like an eternity, once. Now it’s as though he’s here on borrowed time._

_They give him an A._

_Stitched onto his jersey, it’s like he’s wearing a costume. It’s heavy. A responsibility that Jeff can’t wrap his head around. Because without Eric, without a captain, they’re expected to step up in his place. To fill the hole left in his absence, to replace him. But there’s no replacing Eric. And Jeff certainly can’t._

_All he knows is hockey. He’s a veteran, at twenty-four, and he’s not even sure what that means. He doesn’t have his life in any semblance of order, that’s for sure. And maybe they think this will give him a purpose, set him on the path he was always meant to be on._

_It’s more like a death sentence._

_But he’ll do what he’s always done. Pour himself into his game. Every pass, every goal. Whenever he hits the ice, whenever he’s off it, that’s what he’ll be. Hockey. Seeping out of every pore, coursing through his blood, filling his lungs whenever he breathes in._

_If he can’t have anything else, at least he has this._

\-----

Word gets around that Jeff and Marcus have bonded. Marcus gets congratulatory texts, actually, from friends and ex-teammates.

The weirdest one comes from Gabe Landeskog, if only because it doesn’t make any sense. All he says is, _you’re so much better for skins than eric ever would have been_ and nothing else. Marcus knows that Gabe and Jeff used to play together in juniors, and Marcus has played with Gabe on national teams, so it’s not the text part that’s weird.

Marcus isn’t aware that Jeff had been courted before. He knows, in the vaguest of terms, that things got weird and bad for Jeff in Carolina before he was traded, but Jeff has never offered details and Marcus has never wanted to push him for them.

It’s just that he doesn’t really know what Gabe is talking about, and he’s not sure who Eric is. It only takes a little bit of Googling to figure out that when Gabe says Eric, he means Eric Staal, who was captain of the Hurricanes for a while. Then Marcus ties that to how upset Jeff was after having dinner with Jordan Staal, who’s still on the Hurricanes.

He texts Gabe back.

_eric courted jeff?_

Somehow he gets lucky, and Gabe texts him back relatively quickly.

_sort of? it’s complicated. ask skins._

And Marcus doesn’t _want_ to ask Jeff, because he’s not actually sure that Jeff will tell him, or even wants to talk about it. He could force Jeff to tell him, but that’s not who he is as a person or an Alpha, so that’s not even on the table.

Marcus has generally been pretty terrible at the whole courting thing, but he’d already learned before they bonded that Jeff doesn’t like for Alphas to command him. That’s one of the reasons Jeff and Marcus work; Marcus rarely commands anyone, and the only time he’s done it to Jeff was by accident. He respects that Jeff doesn’t like it.

The only part of courting he’s been good at is building a home for the two of them, the careful construction of the nest they share as a bonded pair.

Marcus was really a fool not to notice they’d bonded long before he did.

Jeff is sprawled out on the couch playing ‘chel when Marcus gets the text back from Gabe, and Marcus goes out and flops down on the couch next to him. Jeff shifts immediately to lean against Marcus without missing a beat.

“When you’re done, can I ask you something?” Marcus says, and Jeff cuts his eyes over to Marcus, but then back to the game.

“Sure,” Jeff says, his tone cautious. There’s a pause, and then Jeff says, “no, my Bondmate asked me a question. I’m out after this.”

Marcus presses his cheek against the top of Jeff’s head and listens to Jeff chattering into his headset as he wraps up the game he’s playing. Once it’s over, he pulls away from Marcus to turn off the system, putting his controller and headset down on the coffee table.

“Okay,” Jeff says, sitting back on the couch and flipping his legs over Marcus’s lap. “What’s up?”

“So I got this text from Landeskog,” Marcus says, resting his hand on Jeff’s ankles. He’s watching Jeff’s face to just see how he reacts to what Marcus says, so he sees the way Jeff frowns and presses his lips into a line.

“And,” Jeff says. And Marcus knows by his tone that Jeff doesn’t want to talk about it.

“And he’s like, you’re better for Skins than Eric ever would have been,” Marcus says, keeping his voice carefully neutral. He doesn’t want to force Jeff to tell him, even by accident, and he doesn’t want Jeff to think that he’s judging him, or anything like that.

Jeff huffs out a sigh, but doesn’t say anything.

“And I figured out that he meant Eric Staal, and I know he was your captain for a while, but when I asked if he courted you, he told me to ask you. So I am,” Marcus says.

“I really don’t want to talk about it,” Jeff says. Marcus sighs, and leaned forward.

“I figured you’d say that,” Marcus says. “But I was hoping that you’d tell me anyway.”

“Are you going to force me?” Jeff asks. Marcus frowns at him.

“You know I wouldn’t,” Marcus says. “I’ve commanded you exactly once since I’ve known you, and it was an accident.”

“I know,” Jeff says, and his face is red, and Marcus isn’t sure if he’s embarrassed or if he’s upset, or if he’s going to cry. Or all three.

“I’m asking you to please tell me,” Marcus says.

“Everyone thought we were going to bond, okay?” Jeff says. “Or. Or most people did. Because it felt like everything he was doing was courtship. And then one day he showed up and he introduced us to his bondmate.”

“And he wasn’t courting you,” Marcus says.

“People knew,” Jeff says. “That that wasn’t what it was. But I didn’t. And no one told me, and they just let me keep thinking that Eric was -” He trails off, his face somehow even redder.

“Is that why you were so upset after dinner with Jordan?” Marcus asks him.

“He knew, you know?” Jeff says. “He knew that Eric was bonded and he knew that I thought Eric was courting me. And he didn’t put a stop to anything. And I had to live with knowing that so many people thought he was courting me. And it felt like I wasn’t - worthy, or like anyone wanted to bond with me.”

“Hey,” Marcus says, and reaches out, tugging at Jeff’s arms until he heaves himself up and into Marcus’s lap. “I wanted to bond with you.”

“You didn’t _want_ to,” Jeff says. “It just happened.”

“You can want things without knowing you want them,” Marcus tells him.

“You wouldn’t have chosen me,” Jeff says. “We didn’t court - we - “

“You wouldn’t have chosen me,” Marcus says. “And I know I suck at courting but I think our nest is nice.”

“You are fucking terrible at courting,” Jeff says, nuzzling his nose down against Marcus’s neck, pressing against his scent glands. “But you smell good.”

“And since you’re scenting me, you know that I mean it when I say I want you,” Marcus says. “And that I want to be with you.”

“I know,” Jeff says, and sighs, his breath hot on Marcus’s neck. “It doesn’t mean I don’t still feel things.”

“What do I do?” Marcus asks. “You’re not unwanted. I wasn’t unwanted. We just. Had to find each other.”

Jeff is quiet after that, slumped down against Marcus, his nose pressed against Marcus’s skin. Marcus just wraps his arms around Jeff. His hair smells like Marcus’s shampoo and Jeff’s scent, a little upset, but nothing like he smelled the night he asked Marcus to pick him up. The night that they bonded.

“Remember the time you tried to punch my face in?” Jeff says after a long while of them sitting in silence.

Marcus barks out a laugh at the idea. That seems like it had been so long ago. “I’d never wanted to fight someone as much as I wanted to fight you that night,” Marcus says. “I never understood why. But I guess it makes sense, now.”

“You made me flash,” Jeff tells him. “I’d never had a flash heat before.”

Marcus buries a smile in Jeff’s hair. “Sorry it took me so long to get here,” he says.

“It’s okay,” Jeff says. “I guess we needed time.”

“Come to bed with me,” Marcus says to him, and Jeff nods his head.

They fall asleep together, Jeff’s head on Marcus’s chest, curled up in the blankets that make up their nest, insulated from the outside world by the hum of the heater and the rumble of Marcus’s Alpha purr. 

\-----

_The whole season feels like a death knell._

_It’s not just Jeff, it’s the whole team. No matter what they do, they can’t seem to get going, to make it work. It’s an exercise in frustration, as the season winds down, knowing that they’re going to miss the playoffs. No matter how hard he fights, pushes, and claws, he can never quite make it there, and his summer is coming around too soon, once again._

_He’s given all of himself to this team. His life. His love. But it’s not enough. It’s never enough. Peters asks and asks, and Jeff tries, to be the player he wants, that the Canes need, but the relationship went sour long, long ago. The player that Peters wants isn’t Jeff, and he’s spent three years trying to be someone he’s not._

_Carolina just isn’t home anymore. And the mere thought of that is terrifying enough. Carolina is all he’s ever known, since he was drafted at eighteen. Wide-eyed and with his whole future ahead of him. Now he’s twenty-five, and facing down the barrel of leaving the only NHL team he’s ever played for, the city that has shaped his early adult life._

_But the Canes are going to look different next season, in a way that Jeff can’t even begin to fathom being a part of. There’s little to no chance that Cam will return, and Elias is suffocating under the strain, just like Jeff is. The only way is out, it feels like, but it’s easier to think that in the relative safety of his own head, than say the words out loud._

_Because once he speaks its existence into the universe, there’s no going back._

_But as he stands, in the locker room, listening and listening, to every single way he’s failing Peters, failing the team, even when his scoring is good for second on the team, extending their life far beyond any expectations, he knows that this has to be it._

_Raleigh is bleeding him dry. If he doesn’t do something, it’ll take the rest of his heart from him._

_When he gets back to his place that night, exhausted in a way that he can’t quantify, he sinks down onto his sofa, equipment bag abandoned in the hallway. He sits in silence for what could be hours, staring at his agent’s contact on the screen of his phone, wondering if he’s going to do this._

_His hands are shaking when he hits call._

_They make small talk, to start. But they both know that it’s a pretense. “Find me somewhere,” he says, eventually, and it’s a surprise that his voice is as steady as it is, when he feels like he’s about to cry. “I need to--”_

_“Okay,” his agent says. And just like that, he’s taken the first step. He has some power here, at least, in a way that he hasn’t for some time. A no-trade clause that will need to be waived, in order for Carolina to move him._

_His next home, whichever team will have him, is ultimately his choice._

_Jeff thinks about Eric, then. About Minnesota. About the photo of a second, tiny, blonde baby cradled in his arms, plastered all over social media, as congratulations poured in. A soft, gentle smile on his face. Jeff wants to be full to the brim with love again, overflowing with it._

_He’s not going to find that in Carolina._

_Jeff tips himself back, until he’s staring up at the ceiling. There’s a knot in his chest that feels like it’s loosened, just a little, a pressure that he’s become so used to living with that he forgot it was there._

_He breathes in._

\-----

Game 82. Their last chance to claim a wild card slot and go into the playoffs for the first time since 2011.

The Flyers are giving them hell. Well, Carter Hart is giving them hell, not giving up any ground, and it’s a miracle that Ullmark is standing on his head as well.

There are just seconds left. If Marcus can win the faceoff, they can get a chance to put it in the net. Marcus just has to win the faceoff. The circumstances have to be perfect.

They are.

Marcus wins the faceoff, scooting the puck out to one of his teammates. They’re able to keep it in the zone, to get set up, to start working. He gets the puck back, he gets it over to Jeff and - 

Everyone’s screaming.

“Joey,” Jeff is screaming into his face. “Joey!”

“Fuck yeah!” Marcus screams back at him, and then someone else crashes into them and everything is noise.

They get back to the bench and the rest of the team is screaming. In less than a minute they’re going to the playoffs. Even if the Flyers tie it, they only need one point.

Marcus can feel Jeff radiating heat next to him as they stand on the bench, leaned over in anticipation. There’s too much emotion and Marcus doesn’t realize that it’s too much heat coming off of Jeff, but when they make it to the locker room, he notices the change in the way Jeff smells.

Something new, something different, threaded through the excitement and the joy at making the playoffs.

“Skins,” Eichel is screaming, throwing his arms around Jeff. “Fucking rights!”

He’s on both Jeff and Marcus, and everyone is yelling, celebrating.

“We should go out!” Eichel screams at them over the noise of everything else. There are a lot of shouts of agreement.

“Get through media first!” Kruger shouts at them. “And don’t get too excited, this isn’t over!”

“We’re going to the playoffs boys!” Eichel shouts.

They get themselves together for the media availability. Marcus had the primary, won the faceoff, wears an A, and he can’t keep the smile off his face as he answers questions. He can’t stop looking over at Jeff, smiling and sweaty and flushed.

Even over the smell of the locker room, over the smell of 20 sweaty, overexerted bodies, he can smell Jeff. And he normally can’t. He has the brief thought that it’s weird, but he doesn’t know what it is.

He comes out of the showers to dress and Jeff almost causes him to drop his towel, grabbing him and jamming their mouths together.

“Hey!” Eichel yells. “That’s a fine, dudes.”

Jeff doesn’t acknowledge that it was said, and they’re being cat-called, and while everyone knows they’re bonded, this is not something that happens in their locker room. It makes Marcus uncomfortable, it makes Jeff uncomfortable, they keep it for private.

The way Jeff smells clicks. Marcus didn’t recognize it for what it was because he’s never smelled Jeff in heat. But suppressants can’t overcome this level of heightened emotion, the feedback loop between the two of them that causes Marcus’s excitement and joy to push Jeff’s, to make it stronger and sharper than his feelings would be alone.

Suppressants don’t stop flash heats.

“We have to go,” Marcus says, trying to hold onto his towel. “Let me get dressed, we have to go.”

“We have to go out,” Eichel says from somewhere nearby. “Come on man.”

“No, I have to take him _home_ ,” Marcus says.

“Dude, come on, you have to celebrate with us, that’s fucked up,” Eichel says. Jeff’s hands are _on_ Marcus and if they don’t get out of there it’s going to be a problem.

The overwhelming sense of embarrassment Marcus feels is not dampening the biology pushing Jeff forward. He shoves Jeff’s hands away from him.

“Jeff, stop,” he says, and he has to command it. It makes him feel shitty to have commanded Jeff at all, but he doesn’t see any other way to make it happen. He’ll have to ask for forgiveness later, and he’s not sure that he deserves it. “You have to let me get dressed.”

“Dude,” Eichel says, because he knows that Jeff hates to be commanded. Jeff’s hands drop to his sides and Marcus can tell that he’s fighting against the command even as he’s obeying it, whether because he’s Jeff or because his instincts are telling him that he needs to be touching his Alpha - or both.

“He’s flashing,” Marcus says, and Eichel’s eyes actually go wide. He can tell that Eichel didn’t know, or didn’t think of it.

“Shit,” Eichel says.

“We have to _go_ ,” Marcus says, even as he’s tugging on his clothes. “I promise you we will party with you tomorrow night. Have a team dinner. I don’t fucking know.”

“Do you need, like, a ride?” Eichel asks. “You don’t think he’s gonna - “

“I’m right _here_ ,” Jeff says, irritable. “Don’t fucking talk about me like I’m not.”

“Don’t get in a car accident because he can’t keep his hands off you,” Eichel says.

“It will be fine,” Marcus says.

“Don’t command me again,” Jeff says. Marcus reaches out, grabs Jeff by the chin, and kisses him. He doesn’t let go of Jeff’s face, even after he pulls back.

“Then you’re going to be good and do what I tell you until we’re home safe,” Marcus says. He doesn’t command it. Jeff whimpers his assent anyway.

They owe a lot of money to the board for a lot of things. For kissing in the locker room, for skipping a team outing. And Marcus will pay it, but Jeff is squirming in the passenger seat next to him as Marcus drives, needy and uncomfortable, his hand occasionally ghosting down over his own dick because Marcus won’t allow Jeff to touch him.

Jeff is climbing across the console of the car as soon as they’re in the garage, before Marcus has even killed the engine. He’s sweaty and slick has soaked through his suit pants, and the dry cleaning is going to be embarrassing but at least Marcus’s car seats are easy to clean.

He pops open the door and slides away from Jeff, who has to fumble back into the seat and then out the passenger side door while Marcus is basically fleeing from him, leading him on into the house and down the hallway to the bedroom. If Jeff didn’t need a knot so badly, Marcus would just get him off in the car, or in the living room, but those aren’t places he wants to be when they’re locked together.

He lets Jeff catch him in the doorway of the bedroom, lets Jeff tug his shirt out of his pants until Jeff’s hands are hot against his skin.

“Please,” Jeff says, his tone desperate.

“Yes,” Marcus says.

They lose buttons off of Marcus’s shirt and Marcus is pretty sure he hears a rip as Jeff pulls his own off, but it doesn’t matter now that they’re home, now that he can let himself get taken away by the hot wave of Jeff’s heat.

Jeff shoves him down on the bed and Marcus goes easily, because Marcus has already taken away Jeff’s free will once tonight, he might as well let Jeff run the show when it comes to the sex. The insides of Jeff’s thighs are slick when he straddles Marcus’s hips, when he grinds himself down against Marcus.

He takes Marcus’s cock with no fingers first, letting out a sharp little gasp and then a sigh of relief as Marcus’s cock fills him. Marcus reaches up and laces his fingers through Jeff’s as Jeff starts to rock his hips, using Marcus's body to fuck himself to relief.

Marcus lets him, rests his hands on Jeff’s hips and goes along for the ride.

“Please, please - I need - “ Jeff is panting, rocking his hips, grinding down against Marcus. He leans forward, his hands on Marcus’s shoulders, changes his angle, and Marcus reaches for Jeff’s dick.

There’s an aching, swelling feeling to having a knot, and Marcus can feel it growing heavy and he’s close, so close to being able to give Jeff what he’s so desperate for. He tugs Jeff down until their faces are close, and Jeff tilts his head, presses his mouth over Marcus’s scent glands, then digs his teeth in, making Marcus gasp and jerk his hips up.

Jeff yelps as Marcus’s knot locks them together, and he comes, hot and wet between them where their stomachs are pressed together.

Marcus holds him, breathless, and Jeff sobs against his neck. He just holds on, stroking his fingers through Jeff’s hair until Jeff calms down, until his breathing becomes steady against Marcus’s neck. Eventually, they pull apart and Jeff curls up on his side, and Marcus wraps his arms around him, pulling the blanket up over them.

“I’m sorry I commanded you,” Marcus says in the quiet later when they’re dozing together. Jeff shifts until he’s looking at Marcus, blinking sleepily. “I know you don’t like it.”

“I think,” Jeff says. “I think it’s okay. In this case. Jumping you in the locker room probably would have been embarrassing.”

“Probably,” Marcus says, and smiles. Jeff kisses him, soft and sweet and tired.

“We’re going to the playoffs,” Jeff whispers to him after a moment.

Marcus laughs and tips Jeff over onto his back, pressing him down into the mattress as they kiss.

\-----

_It’s odd getting the notification for your own trade on the NHL app._

_Jeff sets the roll of tape down on top of the box that he’s been packing, one of the last before his whole life in Carolina is wrapped up, due to be shipped to Buffalo in the next couple of days._

_He knew, of course, before it was announced, where he was going. There were options in the mix, but nothing had felt quite as right as Buffalo did. The Sabres aren’t a playoff team, by any stretch of the imagination, but there’s potential, in Eichel, in their young core._

_It could be home, given time, and it’s close enough to Toronto that his family can come by with more than a passing regularity. It’s a year, at minimum, with unrestricted free agency looming on the horizon. All of the pressure is off. If Buffalo isn’t it, he has another shot in the summer. It’s as close to perfect as he could have ever hoped for._

_Eichel had texted him, the moment the deal was finalized, welcoming him to the team, asking when he’d be arriving in Buffalo. They’ve got tentative plans for dinner, before training camp kicks off, and it puts him at ease that maybe, just maybe, they might want him as much as he wants to be there. He waived his no-trade clause, after all. That has to count for something._

_Jeff wants this to work out. Hasn’t wanted anything quite as much as this since... well. Since Eric._

_He scrolls through the article, casting his eyes over the assets that Buffalo needed to move to secure him. Jeff won’t make any pretenses at speculating what he’s worth – there are people far smarter than him who are paid to know that – but there’s at least a good chunk of assets heading back Carolina’s way. It’s not nothing._

_He slips his phone into his pocket, turning his focus back to closing out his life in Raleigh, before the deluge of messages come pouring in. Whether they’re ones of congratulations, disbelief, or otherwise, it doesn’t really matter, in the grand scheme of things. His leaving will barely be a drop in the ocean – there are far more prolific assets in play this offseason, who will command far more media attention in the coming days, no doubt._

_But for Jeff, it’s more than just a change of scenery. An opportunity to reinvigorate his career, away from a place that made him feel trapped, and helpless, caught in a cycle that was dragging him down and under._

_It’s a chance to start over. In every sense of the word._

_At nineteen, Jeff thought he knew what the rest of his life, his career would look like. He’d play in Carolina with Eric until he retired, his number hanging in the rafters, bringing the Cup back to the city, and home, a family, with someone he loved. Who he thought loved him too._

_At twenty-five, he knows better. He’ll take each day as it comes, contribute to the team in any possible way that he can, work with them to orbit ever-closer to that coveted spot in the postseason._

_It’s not going to be easy, nothing that’s worth it ever is._

_But Jeff is ready, he thinks, for whatever happens next._

**Author's Note:**

> ghosthunter is on twitter @notedgoon and llwyncelyn is on twitter @Ilwyncelyn.


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